


Just Trying to Even it Out

by desperately_human



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Croatoan/Endverse (Supernatural), Endverse, Episode: s05e04 The End, Hurt No Comfort, M/M, and things do not get fixed, enjoy :), there's a blowjob and a lot of panic, we're in Dean's head and it's not fun
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-15
Updated: 2021-02-15
Packaged: 2021-03-16 16:27:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29456721
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/desperately_human/pseuds/desperately_human
Summary: Cas-not-Cas was on his knees on the floor, between the legs of a half-dressed man sitting on the edge of the bed, his head bowed bobbing and oh. Oh, he should not be here for this. He couldn’t move, couldn’t quite breathe. The man had one hand fisted in Cas’s messy hair and Cas’s face was tilted up, his eyes open and glazed with awe. It was obscene, watching Cas like this, Cas who was still somehow holy and pure, Cas on his knees as if in prayer, with that look on his face that was almost like worship. It was wrong and beautiful and dizzyingly arousing and Dean couldn’t make his feet move. Dean clenched his fist against the wall, reminding himself to breathe, feeling the sharp dig of his nails into his palms.This is an " If i could put One destiel kiss in the whole show it'd be endverse dean and endverse cas. It would fuck up 09 dean so hard" story
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester, Endverse Castiel/Endverse Dean Winchester
Comments: 11
Kudos: 58





	Just Trying to Even it Out

**Author's Note:**

  * For [howevernot](https://archiveofourown.org/users/howevernot/gifts).



> I was talking about this with a friend and realized I couldn't let it go until I wrote it. I have so many thoughts about endverse Dean and Cas and only a tiny number of them come through in this. but it des the thing! The thing its supposed to. Written over three late nights to a constant soundtrack of "Even" by Julien Baker, on a loop (also the source of the title) with the intention of upsetting howevernot (ily <3 ) but you can be upset by it, too!

Dean wandered unthinking around the camp, sticking to the shadows and watching people, _his_ people, preparing supplies, talking in low voices. Every once in a while, laughter echoed across the camp, sharp and brittle and stabbing through his head like ice. A chill settled into his bones as night fell, cold wind mourning between the cabins, knocking on the windows. He didn’t know what to do with his hands, with his feet, with the thoughts swirling in his head, pushing their way to the front of his mind in the darkness. He needed lights, sound, people. He needed a drink. Anything to stop…doing this. Thinking in the dark.

Cas would, _this_ Cas would have something he could drink. Probably more than that, judging from the state of him earlier. Dean kicked the toe of his boot against the bottom step of the cabin, hands in his pockets. Earlier had been…something. Cas, not-Cas, not _his_ Cas who absolutely wasn’t _his,_ not like that. This Cas, with his long words and the smile that sat all wrong on his face, unnerved him. Had Dean spent so many hours and silly little jokes trying to get Cas to smile, only now to realize that he hated it? Dean couldn’t take his eyes off him, 2014 Cas, in his casual clothes and his casual smile and the wink he tossed over his shoulder when Dean opened the door. It was like a sick dream, like someone had taken a list of all the things he wanted and never would have asked for, and given them to him gift-wrapped all twisted up wrong. He kind of never wanted to see this Cas again. He kind of really wanted a drink.

He half-expected the cabin to be full of people, as it had been when he arrived. Standing on the top step, his hand resting against the door, he suddenly remembered that orgies had been mentioned, and almost turned around and fled But, hey, if that was what was happening, that was almost better for him. Slip in while everyone was distracted, grab a bottle of something. Stand there for just a second, find Cas among the crowd of—nope. Definitely not that. He pushed open the door.

The room was silent, the kitchen was messy but empty. Dean glanced around, spotting a bottle of liquor on one of the shelves across the room, by the beaded curtain. The wooden floor creaked under his boots as he crossed the room and stopped, one hand raised. He could hear soft sounds from the bedroom, quiet moans and the sound of someone moving, and it was kind of short circuiting his brain. Cas’s bedroom, Cas with…? Without thinking, he had taken a step forward and was peering between the beads across the door.

Cas-not-Cas was on his knees on the floor, between the legs of a half-dressed man sitting on the edge of the bed, his head bowed bobbing and _oh._ Oh, he should _not_ be here for this. He couldn’t move, couldn’t quite breathe. The man had one hand fisted in Cas’s messy hair and Cas’s face was tilted up, his eyes open and glazed with awe. It was obscene, watching Cas like this, Cas who was still somehow holy and pure, Cas on his knees as if in prayer, with that look on his face that was almost like worship. It was wrong and beautiful and dizzyingly arousing and Dean couldn’t make his feet move. Dean clenched his fist against the wall, reminding himself to breathe, feeling the sharp dig of his nails into his palms.

Cas had tears in his eyes, and Dean wasn’t sure if they were from pain or emotion. He felt a stab of envy of the man on the bed, watching him tighten his hand in Cas’s hair, and wow that sure wasn’t an emotion he wanted to examine too closely. Except, there was something familiar about the man, the lines of his back, the low sound of pleasure he made in his throat, and then he tipped his head back, eyes closed, and Dean found himself staring into his own face. His future self was thinner, and even in this moment there was a tightness in his jaw, but the knowledge that he was watching _himself_ get blown by _Cas_ was like a punch to Dean’s gut.

Now, he told himself, he should really leave. Except…he was already in the room. Not just here by the door, but on the bed, that was him, too. So, perhaps he had some kind of right to be here after all, and it wasn’t like he could talk his overheating, frozen body into leaving anyway. So he let himself lean against the wall, his fingers tingling with the unreality of watching himself orgasm, of watching Cas-but-not-Cas look up at him-but-not-him with shining eyes, as though he were something precious. His future self slumped forward, his hand still in Cas’s hair, his forehead pressed against Cas’s as he caught his breath. Dean watched as Cas reached out, slipped his hand gently around future Dean’s neck and pulled him into a kiss; as future Dean fell forward into it, kissed back hard. Dean wasn’t sure if it was his own longing he could feel or if he was reading his future self’s body language, but the strength of the feeling knocked the breath from his body, and then suddenly future Dean jerked back. He stood sharply, one hand buttoning his pants as the other hand, resting on Cas’s shoulder, pushed him away until Cas fell back onto the floor, still gazing up at Dean, the wonder in his eyes draining to be replaced by a splintered hurt. He was shaking, not bothering to hide the tears that sprung to his eyes, and future Dean stepped past him and walked toward the door without looking back.

Dean’s body unfroze and he stumbled back, the footsteps of his future self echoing against the walls of his head and he bolted for the door. No way, no way in hell, was he ready to have this conversation with himself. Not in the privacy of his own home talking to the mirror, and most certainly not between a bead curtain and a shelf of canned food, with a flesh-and-blood self who had just—nope. Not doing that. He jumped down the steps, mindless of the clatter of his boots on the wood, spun around the corner of the cabin and pressed himself against the wood and a second pair of identical footsteps followed him out. He stood frozen, just feet away from where his future self had stumbled to a stop and was leaning against the cabin wall just around the corner. Staring into the darkness, trying to not let his brain catch up with what he had seen, Dean missed the way his future self closed his eyes, the expression of deep-cutting pain that flashed across his face and knocked him breathless for a second, before he clenched his jaw against the feeling and walked briskly off into the darkness.

Dean let himself slide down the wall and sit on the ground, dropping his head back to rest against the wood. The image flashed across his mind of himself, his other self, head tipped back in pleasure, and he jerked upright. He wasn’t going here, would like to never go there again. Except, there were hours until morning, and it was dark, and his future self was off somewhere readying his troops for certain death in the morning and what was Dean supposed to think about all night except—

It was cold, at night. Dean pulled his knees up to his chest and leaned back against the wall again. And Cas, not his Cas but not _not_ his Cas, exactly, was on the other side of this wall, with that look on his face. His Cas, 2009 Cas, was hard to read, could turn his blue eyes to ice and almost look like he meant it when he told Dean he would send him back to Hell. This Cas had looked at him, not him, almost him, with every feeling in the world painted on his face, and it sure looked like hurt, like pain, like love. Dean wanted to punch himself in the face, to shout and scream and tell him to fix it, except it wasn’t like he would do any better, was it?

It wasn’t like he hadn’t thought about it, sometimes. About Cas, thought about him like that. Sometimes he wanted—and that was what happened, wasn’t it, when he got the things he wanted? He ruined them. He always had. The look on future Cas’s face, like Dean had stabbed him in the stomach. Things would always end this way, they had told him, this was who he would always be. And maybe, maybe he could fix things in his timeline, some things. Maybe he could save Sam. But he, _he_ , would always be this, because he already was this, wasn’t he, really?

He was still slumped against the wall when the sun rose, pale light filtering through the clouds, when the camp woke up and he followed his future self into a battle to the death. He tried to shut down his mind, narrow his focus to the hunt, the one thing in front of his face, the way he always had. Mostly it worked. Watching his future self send his friends, send Cas, to their death hurt like a dull blade dug into soft flesh, and seeing his little brother possessed by Lucifer was the knife yanked out again, and then before he could bleed to death he was shouting at Zachariah and then he was on the side of the road, with Cas, and the night air tasted sweet and his heart ached.

“We had an appointment,” Cas said, and Dean wasn’t sure if there was any humor there, because Cas, his Cas, was still unreadable and confusing and wearing his stupid, perfect coat.

“Don’t ever change,” Dean said, wishing everything could freeze in that moment, wanting to shut his eyes against the future. He knew what Cas looked like with his lips red and his hair messy and his face tilted up, knew what he looked like in pain. He wanted to see it again, wanted to see what Cas looked like after kissing for hours, what he looked like waking up in the morning, and no, that didn’t make any sense but he wanted…he _wanted._ And that just showed, didn’t it, that just really proved it. What he would do if he got the chance, who he would be. Who he was already.

Cas titled his head to one side, reading some trace of Dean’s anguish on his face, and took a step forward, one hand reaching out. Dean jumped back, pulling his arm out of Cas’s reach, and for a split second he recognized the expression on Cas’s face. Surprised, confused. Hurt. Just the way that Cas-not-Cas had looked at him-not-him, on his knees on the dirty floor of a messy cabin in a whole messy world. And for one weak moment he took half a step forward, and then Cas’s face smoothed out to neutral and Dean remembered what he was doing and why he was doing it. It would be so easy, he could see it, so easy in so many ways to do so many things wrong. But he knew, he understood, what he would do to Cas, what he would do to _everyone,_ who he _was._ So he turned away, crossing his arms and digging his nails into his palms as hard as he could, and watched the cars fly past on the highway until he was alone.


End file.
